


A Wild Heart Below Deck

by MrRhapsodist



Series: Sweet Domestic Star Wars Saga [4]
Category: Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Force Unleashed - All Media Types
Genre: Diapers, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Fugitives, Hurt/Comfort, Mommy Issues, Order 66, Platonic Female/Female Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-06
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:48:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26840905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrRhapsodist/pseuds/MrRhapsodist
Summary: The Jedi Order is fallen, and the Empire has risen from the ashes. In the chaos, a Jedi Master escapes the massacre on Coruscant.But she has an unexpected companion while on the run, and her wounds require a certain amount of padding...
Relationships: Maris Brood/Shaak Ti
Series: Sweet Domestic Star Wars Saga [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1942525
Comments: 3
Kudos: 6





	A Wild Heart Below Deck

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AgonyEcstasyIrony](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgonyEcstasyIrony/gifts).



The star freighter’s cargo hold rattled as, finally, the gargantuan vessel escaped Coruscant’s gravity well and made the jump to lightspeed.

Deep within that cargo hold, a single crate’s hatch finally popped open.

Two curved white horns poked out from inside the crate. They rose up, revealing a pair of head-tails and a multicolored face with red, puffy eyes.

The Togruta shut her eyes for a long moment, wrapping herself deeper in the Force that she had used to sustain herself during the long escape from the fires and blaster bolts, from security checkpoint scanners and probe droid patrols. A mind tricked dock worker and a friendly astromech droid named R7-T9 had been her only saving grace during one of the longest nights of her life. A night filled with searing heartache and sudden, world-ending losses piling on top of each other.

When she opened her eyes again, Shaak Ti took in her new surroundings.

She hadn’t understood  _ how _ the end of the Clone Wars had turned into an act of betrayal. Hours ago, she’d been meditating in one of the lower chambers of the august Jedi Temple, reaching out for the dark side’s shatterpoint to aid Master Windu’s self-appointed mission. Now, Shaak Ti sat alone in a hold full of cargo crates and precious water tanks, on a freighter carrying refugees away from Coruscant’s Underlevels for a stopover on Corellia before proceeding to Nal Hutta. Instead of gentle sloping staircases and marble columns, the Jedi Master had only grime-covered boxes and flickering glowpanels for company.

Well, that and a lone astromech droid rolling up with a questioning whistle.

“I’m fine, thank you.” Shaak Ti brushed at the sore tips of her head-tails. She sighed and massaged her face, willing away the last signs of her meditative trance. “How long until we reach Corellia?”

Arseven let out a soft  _ theroo-wheep. _ In the red-and-gold droid’s vocabulary, that meant,  _ An hour, give or take. _

In the Force, Shaak Ti grasped the little droid’s meaning. At the periphery of her Jedi senses, she could detect several ships amassing along the Core Worlds. They were answering a summons, a time-to-come-home signal broadcast from the Republic’s capital itself.

Now, she supposed, it was the  _ Empire’s _ capital. An empire for the victorious Sith.

She pressed her face into her hands, wishing she could weep. But no tears came.

Arseven offered a sympathetic beep and extended a small red claw from inside his torso to tap the Togruta’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” Shaak Ti said. To whom, she wasn’t sure. Perhaps the droid. Perhaps her fallen friends. Perhaps to the entire galaxy.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated softly, closing her eyes again. “We failed you.”

But in the midst of that pain, as her chest blossomed with a sob that never quite reached her throat, Shaak Ti felt something shift in the Force. It was a small thing, a delicate quiver of pain and misery that gave her company inside the giant cargo hold.

Her head snapped upward.

“Arseven,” she asked, “who else is in here?”

The astromech droid responded with a series of low chirps and whistles. Before Shaak Ti could ask what he meant, he rolled off to a different cargo hold. His tiny red manipulator claw waved back and forth, as if motioning for the Jedi Master to follow him.

So she did.

* * *

It was cold and dark, and she hated the smell.

So what if she was hurting? The whole galaxy was on fire, and she couldn’t do anything about it.

She couldn’t even call herself a Jedi. Jedi were supposed to  _ save _ people, weren’t they? Now they were all dead or in need of saving. So what good were they, she wondered, if the galaxy didn’t need them anymore?

Inside a cargo crate, with a old, badly applied bacta pad slapped across her abdomen, the woman who had once been a Jedi resigned herself to dying alone.

She knew there was no way help would come in time. She and her Master had answered the call on their Jedi beacons. They’d raced back to Coruscant in record time, hoping to be received at the Temple with news about the war’s imminent end.

Instead, she’d watched, screaming in fury and tears, as clones opened fire on her Master. They moved as if they weren’t even humans, but droids in white armor, mowing down a man she’d come to see as her own father. And when they’d pointed their blasters at her, the woman who had once been a Jedi took out her lightsaber and cut them to pieces. She didn’t do it out of the calm and centered poise her Master had always tried to instill in her.

No. She would laugh and cry at the sight of their blood, at the sound of severed limbs hitting the landing pad, at the cut-short screams when she took off their heads.

Running headlong into the rain-filled night, stealing an airspeeder from someone’s garage and waving a lightsaber in their face when confronted about it, all she had left was her own life.

But now, hours later, stuck inside a cargo crate with urine-soaked pants and an abdominal injury, all she could do was groan softly and wait for the end to come. If she focused, she could recite the Jedi Code to herself. Take comfort in its ancient words. But those words rang hollow in her ears. The whole universe had collapsed on her head overnight. Everyone she’d ever known or loved was dead, and the dark side stood triumphant on Coruscant itself.

She closed her eyes and waited for the end.

Eventually, the pain would stop. It’d have to stop.

She didn’t expect someone to open the cargo crate from the outside.

The moment the lid came free, she let out a hiss and turned her face away.

“Oh,” a soft voice exclaimed. “You survived.”

“Let me go,” she muttered back. “I’m already dead, I...”

“No, you’re not.” A gentle hand, covered in velvety red skin, landed on her shoulder. “You’re not because  _ I’m _ not dead either. We’re alive, and we have the Force to thank.”

“Who  _ are _ you?” Turning her face up, she squinted against the harsh, flickering light of the cargo hold’s glowpanels.

What she saw took her breath away.

“I’m all that’s left of the Jedi Council,” said Master Shaak Ti, the Hero of Hypori and a dozen other battlefields. Her red-and-white face markings twisted into a sad, tired smile. “And  _ you, _ Padawan, could use a fresh change of clothes.”

The Padawan—who’d once been called Maris Brood—could only nod in silence.

* * *

Shaak Ti had never been a mother. Or an aunt, or an older sister, for that matter. She’d spent some time visiting children in the Temple nursery, sometime before the war started, when the Force had been so bathed in darkness and grief. But she’d never handled childrearing or anything beyond basic field medicine.

So, when Arseven returned with a clean jumpsuit, fresh bacta pads, and a diaper, the Jedi Master was a bit reluctant to proceed.

But seeing Maris curled up in the empty crate, red-eyed and bitter, she knew she had to try.

“Here.” Offering her hand, Shaak Ti helped the young Zabrak out of the crate. She caught her by the shoulders, feeling atrophied muscles and translucent skin.

Moving her behind a wall of cargo containers, where security cams and droid patrols wouldn’t see them, Shaak Ti helped her recline fully on top of what remained of her Jedi Master’s robe. It was torn and shredded where glancing blaster bolts had singed through the fabric, but the tailors had made those cloaks to last.

“I don’t  _ need _ that,” Maris insisted. She scowled at the crinkling garment Shaak Ti held in her hands. “I’m not a baby.”

“Of course not.” Shaak Ti kept her voice gentle. She didn’t have the granite face of Mace Windu or the soft scolding tone of Yoda. She nodded and gestured to the ruined pants the Zabrak wore. “But we can’t leave you in those. And I need to apply fresh bacta to the wound.”

While she spoke, she reached deep within herself. A wellspring of light and hope filled her heart, cutting her to the quick as she let out a long exhale. Concentrating, Shaak Ti willed that light aura to spill free from her hands and across Maris’s skin. She felt for broken and sprained bones, for clotting blood and infections, and the source of the girl’s torment. So many knots scattered themselves across the Zabrak’s body and soul, forming a dense sea of thorns that no gardener could clear away by themselves.

But Shaak Ti was nothing if not patient. And so long as she lived, she’d show this girl the Force.

Her light radiated against the dark clouds brewing inside Maris’s heart. She touched on emotions buried behind durasteel walls and thorn-covered vines, on white-hot rage and choking gray grief. And when she felt—heard—blaster bolts hitting the body of a Jedi Master she didn’t recognize, she understood the girl’s despair.

Opening her eyes, Shaak Ti unfolded the diaper. “Now, my dear, shall we get started...?”

Her voice trailed off.

Maris stared up at her, crying. Her face had twisted into a pitiful frown. Her hands reached for Shaak Ti, the way an infant would grab for their mother, and it was all she could do to remember the Jedi’s rule against attachments.

But there were no Jedi left. And rules weren’t what this woman needed right then.

Bending down, Shaak Ti let the diaper fall to the floor. She swept Maris’s head to her breast and cradled her by the shoulders. She let her cry into her old, sweat-stained tunic. Maris wept and pawed at her, and the urine odor only grew stronger in their tiny section of the cargo hold.

“Shh.” Shaak Ti slid a head-tail along Maris’s neck, hugging her with the tendril. “You’re safe. You’ll be fine. You have my word.”

“I-I’m safe...” Maris echoed in between wracking sobs. “I have... your word...”

“That’s right.” Shaak Ti pulled back long enough to gaze into the young woman’s gold eyes. She offered a quick caress along her head, ignoring her matted black hair and sharp cranial horns. “Now, will you let me help you, young one? Or do I need to put you to sleep to cooperate?”

A long silence fell. Then, nodding, Maris let her head fall back onto the bundled-up top of the Jedi robe she used for a makeshift blanket.

Shaak Ti rolled up her sleeves and went to work.

Peeling off the young woman’s boots and pants wasn’t difficult. The harder part was getting rid of her undergarments and the now-dried bacta pad on her abdomen. The two items had crusted together with old blood, and when she pried them loose, Shaak Ti was treated to an angry dark wound on pale skin.

Maris whimpered as Shaak Ti placed a fresh bacta strip along her stomach.

“Relax,” she whispered. “I’ll only be a moment longer.”

She looked to Arseven, who had retrieved the fallen diaper and handed it back to her. Shaak Ti nodded her thanks and began to slide it underneath Maris’s rear.

She’d never done this before. But she’d seen mothers on Coruscant and a dozen other worlds tend to their infants, and she knew the general idea. It was a matter of keeping Maris still and quiet while she applied more bacta between her legs, soothing away the worst of the crimson wound. Once the area was clean and scent-free again, Shaak Ti only had to lift up the front of the diaper to the girl’s hips and tape it on.

The rustle inside the cargo hold was a welcome distraction. If she could focus on this, the chaos of the galaxy outside the ship wasn’t so loud. She could come up for air instead of drowning in the aftershock of thousands of deaths.

Once she’d secured the diaper, Shaak Ti stepped back. She clasped her hands together. “Better?”

Maris shifted in place. She prodded the front of her new undergarment.

“It beats the alternative,” she muttered.

“I’m glad.” Shaak Ti bent toward Arseven and took up the fresh jumpsuit. It was one size too big for the Zabrak, but nothing that rolled-up sleeves and pants couldn’t fix.

Sensing the girl’s hesitation, she helped her get dressed. The diaper rustled underneath her flight suit, but Shaak Ti had Maris zipped up and back in her boots like before. She spent a few more minutes tugging everything into place, smiling and gentle as she tried to find a better fit for the clothes their droid friend had discovered.

“You don’t...” Maris groaned. She shook her head. “You don’t have to do this for me, really.”

“It’s no problem.” Shaak Ti sighed and put a hand on the Zabrak’s shoulder. “I’d do this for anyone. I mean it.”

“Wow.” Maris flashed her a wary eye. “Is, um, that why they made you a Jedi Master?”

Shaak Ti chuckled. “Something like that, I suppose. Now, if you can wait a little longer, Arseven here can find us some rations before the ship comes out of hyperspace.”

“I can wait.” Sitting down on a nearby crate, with a not-so-obvious bulge in her jumpsuit’s waist, Maris crossed her legs and folded her arms. “Um, what do I call you? Should I call you ‘Master’ or...?”

“I am Shaak Ti.” Smiling, the Togruta ran a hand along one of her horns. “But whatever makes you comfortable, Maris. It  _ is _ Maris, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” The Zabrak swallowed. “Yeah, that’s my name. That’s... me...”

When her eyes went vacant, and the dark thoughts rushed in, Shaak Ti pulled up a crate beside her. She sat down and pulled the girl into a hug.

The young, pale Zabrak did not resist. She buried her face in Shaak Ti’s chest and wept again.

* * *

“Felucia. I think we’d be safe there.”

Hours had passed since their last conversation. In that time, Maris had undergone a healing trance with help from Shaak Ti. Some color returned to her face, and she was able to walk a little easier around the cargo hold. The ship had briefly docked at a spaceport in Corellia, and they’d hidden away in their respective crates, waiting for binary loadlifters to carry off starship parts and escort a flood of refugees outside.

When Arseven had returned with a medpac and some rations, Shaak Ti and Maris had eaten their fill. They ate without any sense of manners, too hungry to bother with them, although the droid did his best to clean up any crumbs before the janitorial crew spotted them.

But after a much-needed meal, Maris had required a fresh diaper and bacta pad. She submitted to lying on her back again and lifting her legs while Shaak Ti changed her underclothes for her. Another discreet raid of the ship’s medbay had brought the Togruta a package of wipes for cleaning up between the young woman’s legs.

“Felucia,” Maris repeated, staring up at the ceiling as a new diaper was slid underneath her. “Isn’t that where Jedi Aayla Secura went?”

“Yes, but the comm chatter suggests the clones have moved on from there.” Shaak Ti paused before pulling the front of the diaper up between Maris’s legs. “If the Force is with us, then we might be able to go there undetected. There’s so much wilderness to shield us from the Sith.”

“Provided we can find a pilot first.”

“Yes, provided we can do that.”

Maris looked thoughtful. Her golden eyes flashed onto Shaak Ti’s face as the Jedi Master fumbled with the tapes on the diaper, trying to get them to stick in place.

“Master?” Maris asked, her voice suddenly small. “If we go there, and if we stay there...?”

“Yes?” Shaak Ti looked at her and waited.

The young Zabrak let out a soft sigh. She rubbed at her forehead and clasped her hands together over her breast.

“I didn’t plan on it, but...” She hesitated. “But I think I want to continue my Jedi training. Would you be my teacher?” Another moment’s hesitation, her face caught in shadows from the flickering glowpanels overhead. “Please?”

Shaak Ti’s breath caught in her throat. It wasn’t simply the innocent, nervous smile that Maris wore. It wasn’t simply the aura of hope that radiated from inside the young Padawan’s heart. When Shaak Ti looked down at her, in the stillness of the freighter’s hold, what she saw was a deep scar, blacker than anything the war had done to the Jedi.

The scar of an orphan. The scar of abandonment and going hungry on the streets, before a kindly old Master brought her to Coruscant for training.

Tears filled her eyes. Shaak Ti blinked them away and drew a calming breath.

_ I am one with the Force, _ she reminded herself,  _ and the Force is with me. _

She said it to herself again and again, less of a mantra and more of a prayer to the energy field that connected all life across the galaxy. And the more she said it, the more Shaak Ti felt those threads of fate binding her to Maris Brood, bandaging up that old dark scar deep inside her chest.

She opened her eyes, letting the tears fall.

Bending down, Shaak Ti embraced the young Zabrak. She let a hand fall to the seat of the girl’s fresh diaper and rested it there. If Maris was embarrassed, she made no show of it.

“You have my word,” said Shaak Ti. “I will train you. I will teach you, Maris. And, if the Force is kind to us, you may have plenty of teach  _ me _ about a life outside of war.”

She heard the sniffle over her shoulder. Pressing Maris harder into her chest, Shaak Ti allowed herself to feel an attachment to the girl, in violation of everything she’d honored while a part of the Jedi Council. And as the ship around them shuddered to life, its engines roaring as liftoff was achieved from the Corellian docks, Shaak Ti felt the Force sing in response to her vow.

Felucia awaited.

**Author's Note:**

> So, can you believe I wrote this in a single afternoon? You can thank [AgonyEcstasyIrony](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgonyEcstasyIrony/pseuds/AgonyEcstasyIrony) for this story prompt. Characters from The Force Unleashed aren't usually in my forte, but once I played with the idea of a Shaak Ti and Maris Brood hurt/comfort ABDL fic, I knew how it had to play out. Hope you've enjoyed reading it as much I did writing it!


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